


sophomore slump

by armageddonkey



Category: Rock & Rule (1983)
Genre: Crushes, F/M, High School, another old thing sorry, im writing something new but i work at the furious speed of a tortoise
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-07-17
Updated: 2015-07-17
Packaged: 2018-04-08 10:08:05
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,027
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4300698
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/armageddonkey/pseuds/armageddonkey
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>angel gets ahead of herself sometimes. most teenagers in this town do. but if their heads were in the clouds, her head was far above, high as the top of the power plant, electric daydreams humming like a guitar chord.</p>
            </blockquote>





	sophomore slump

**Author's Note:**

> this is i think 5 months old??? originally written in my notebook. fixed some things as usual. enjoy.

she never knows how to react when she sees him. usually, she has no time to. he comes shuffling out of a hallway crowd, or hides under staircases, always with his head held down so you can see the black thatch of roots under bright red. she thinks about saying hi, or joining him under the staircase, or even slipping out back with him, all cool and reckless. but suddenly she’s at the door of her next class and he’s disappeared, like the rock n’ roll ghost of ohmtown high.

angel gets ahead of herself sometimes. most teenagers in this town do. but if their heads were in the clouds, her head was far above, high as the top of the power plant, electric daydreams humming like a guitar chord. in history class, when they’re learning about world war III for the hundredth time, she finds it easiest to get lost. she finds herself thinking about dark moody eyes, so dumb and cliche like in those good-girl-meets-bad-boy movies she adored in middle school. angel chews on her purple gel pen and thinks about the hard unsmiling line of lips, the dirty band tee hanging loose on a rigid frame. she pictures the unnatural off-contrast of orange hair and how it might look under a street lamp, in a parking lot post-concert as they’re walking to his car. or in sunshine, blown back from his face while they zoom down an open road, blasting the stones.

he stops by her locker sometimes. she says “hi” and he sorta waves, or sorta nods, or doesn’t do anything. they’ve only got so much time before angel turns to go to chemistry and he turns to go skip in the boy’s bathroom, so while she stuffs books in her bag and clicks the locker shut, she’s trying to think of something to say. something to make her seem cool or interesting or like she doesn’t think of him every time “i love rock n’ roll” comes on the radio. but all she comes up with is “what’s up.” all he comes up with is a shrug. it’s alright, even if they don’t say it. they go down the hall, bumping shoulders as other kids jostle them trying to get to class or their friends. 

angel steals a glance at him and wonders if, in some parallel universe, she could take his hand, if they could be like those couples that kinda make her sick and kinda make her jealous. she knows that not only is she too chicken, but she has too many books hugged to her chest. she wants and she wants, but she doesn’t want enough to risk embarrassing herself in a high school hallway. but it’s nice to think about, watching the sharp outline of his profile till they part ways.

the only class angel skips is gym. she walks right through the locker room, ignoring the stares of the other girls, and goes out the back door to the football field. out there, it’s hot and the air tastes sharp and metallic, the grass dry and dull with nuclear rot. it’s better under the bleachers, where she can write bad songs or just watch cars go by. or imagine someone sitting next to her, strumming that guitar she’s seen slung over his back, hollow and twangy without an amp.

a bus barrels by with an ad for radio active music hall, and she can almost taste the freedom of the words “come on!” as she tugs him on board. ohmtown’s skyline fading away except for the power plant, looking through the back window till it's gone too and they’d laugh and laugh. she hears his laugh different every time, and this time it’s loud and raspy from cigarettes and singing his heart out in radio active, all the sparkling lights popping in her vision even when they’re back in their tiny apartment. even when she’s really on her back under the bleachers and she’s pretty sure the period ended five minutes ago.

he spoke to her, once. it was another stormy morning, everyone’s shoes squeaking and sliding on tiles as they poured into the school. she caught a glimpse of bare arms, the peak of a nose, and before she knew it she was at his side, breathing out “hey” like it was the last of her courage. he whipped around, wet hair still clinging to his neck, and she was about to say sorry or something until he settled back into his usual coolness. almost. there was something in the way he lingered on her from under damp bangs, the anxious part of lips, that came out halting and murmured. “that jacket is… pretty.”

she didn’t know if he was just caught off guard or maybe, just maybe, he’d been wanting and wanting and there was a reason why he was still looking at her face and not the jacket, some red leather number she fished out of the back of her closet. she suddenly saw them in a still frame from some movie, where they already had a happy ending written out several scenes later, so she could bat her lashes and say something like “red’s always been my color” and move to brush a scarlet strand out of his eyes. but he’d already turned away, fingers tight around his backpack strap with embarrassment, and angel remembered she used up the last of her courage anyway.

she still managed a “thank you,” also halting and murmured. she didn’t see him for the rest of the day, but his voice, those words, soft but rough with that accent she hadn’t expected, buzzed in her chest like a current, making her wish she had said something more.

lately, angel’s been dreaming of one thing. it’s different and it almost scares her, how vividly she hears the crowd cheering, the glitz of new records and diamond earrings, KIX radio nuke york sending their names across the airwaves, even thought she doesn’t know his. having it all. as the bell rings, it doesn’t dissolve the dream. it stays inside her real as an organ, the beating of a heart.


End file.
